Sigidi kaSenzangakhona commonly known as Shaka was a great Zulu king and conqueror. He lived in an area of south-east Africa between the Drakensberg and the Indian Ocean, a region populated by many independent Nguni chiefdoms. During his brief reign more than a hundred chiefdoms were brought together in a Zulu kingdom which survived not only the death of its founder but later military defeat and calculated attempts to break it up.
Shaka kaSenzangakhona (Shaka Zulu) is universally recognized as the founder of what would become known as the “Zulu nation”. He ruled from about 1817 until he was assassinated by his half-brothers in 1828. He is credited with elevating the Zulu from a fairly insignificant group, one among others, to a more unified “state”. Shaka conquered, incorporated, or allied with neighbours such as the Mthethwa, Ndwandwe, Hlubi, Qwabe, and Mkhize to dominate a 200 km-wide area north of the present-day city of Durban.
He was known for being an excellent military organizer, motivator, and Visionary. He formed well-trained and well-commanded regiments. King Shaka also redesigned military shields made out of cowhide to provide protection against spears being thrown at the army.
Shaka Zulu was successful in establishing Zulu dominance in southern Africa because he was a great strategist and military innovator. His political objective was to expand his territory with the unification of neighboring clans and war was the primary means used to achieve this.
Shaka Zulu established the Zulu Empire and revolutionized warfare in Southern Africa in the early 19th Century. Shaka was born in 1787. His father, Senzangakhona, was a minor chief of one of the Zulu-speaking clans and his mother, Nandi, was daughter of Chief Mbhengi of the rival clan. Shaka’s birth was considered a sin because his parents were from different clans. Due to pressure from tribal leaders Shaka’s parents separated resulting in the exile of him and his mother from his father’s clan. Shaka’s mother returned to her Elangeni where she was shunned. Consequently, her son Shaka was harassed, tormented, and neglected.
Shaka was a son of Senzangakhona, ruler of an insignificant small chiefdom, the Zulu. His mother was Nandi, the daughter of a Langeni chief. Information about Shaka’s early years is gleaned entirely from oral sources. It is claimed that Shaka was born into Senzangakhona’s household but that the couple were not yet married according to traditional custom. A more credible account is that the relationship between Nandi and Senzangakhona was illicit, and that Shaka was born in Langeni territory at the Nguga homestead of Nandi’s uncle. Shaka’s name is said to stem from Senzangakhona’s claim that Nandi was not pregnant but was suffering from an intestinal condition caused by the iShaka beetle. Despite his attempts to deny paternity, Senzangakhona eventually installed Nandi as his third wife. Shaka thus spent his earliest years at his father’s esiKlebeni homestead near present Babanango, in the hallowed locality known as the EmaKhosini or Burial-place of the Kings, where Senzangakhona’s forebears, the descendants of Zulu (Nkosinkulu), had been chiefs for generations. The relationship of Senzangakhona and Nandi seems to have been unhappy and ended in the chieftain driving Nandi from his court.
Nandi and her son sought sanctuary in the Mhlathuze Valley of the Langeni people. Here, growing up as a fatherless child, Shaka seems to have been the victim of humiliation and cruel treatment by the Langeni boys. At that time there were two strong rival Nguni groups, the Mthethwa led by the paramount chief Dingiswayo, and the Ndwandwe under the ferocious Zwide. Later, probably at the time of the Great Famine, known as the Madlantule (c.1802), Shaka was taken to the Mthethwa people, where shelter was found in the home of Nandi’s aunt. He thus grew up in the court of Dingiswayo, who welcomed them with friendliness. Shaka, however, suffered much from the bullying and teasing of the Mthethwa boys, too, who resented his claims to chiefly descent.
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